Everything I'll Set Free
by CrystallineMaple
Summary: Prussia has twelve hours to make last amends and requests using one-hour conversations with friends, family, and foes. Can he let everyone know what they need to know before he must leave? Will he be able to let go? Multiple slight pairings.
1. Chapter 1

_Ideally, this should have twelve or thirteen chapters. We'll kick off with those nations who aren't so close with Prussia and end with the ones who are - Germany, Hungary, Canada, and so on. At any rate, please enjoy and let me know what you think. Best wishes!_

* * *

><p>Twelve hours isn't very much time, but it's all I've got now.<p>

I know it's coming. I've never been so sure of anything in my life. Death, dissolution, whatever you'd like to call it. It's happening. It's happening _now. _

For the past eight hours, I've been sending e-mails, letters, and texts to everyone, telling them to get down to Germany's house as soon as they can, preferably around _now_. Unfortunately, Germany himself is off on a business trip in Canada, but he said he could make it. He should be here in about seven or eight hours, which is perfect. He's actually coming on a plane to Europe with Canada, so I'll get to see my brother and Birdie at the same time. I'm so lucky.

Except not really.

It's snowing, and the sky is gray, the color of the ocean on a cloudy day. Leafless trees crisscross in the sky, coated with delicate layers of snow, and the scene just outside Germany's kitchen window is so breathtaking and picturesque it takes me a moment to register the sound of someone knocking on the door.

The first visitor.

I head into the foyer and open the door.

Austria's face stares back at me.

"Coffee? Tea?" I ask courteously. I don't have the energy to squabble with Austria anymore. Besides, there are some things I want to say to him. I pull a crumpled piece of notebook paper out of my jacket pocket and smooth it against West's cream-colored walls, squinting at my own messy handwriting. Austria sighs.

I turn. "What? Look, thanks for coming. I-"

"Where is Germany?" Austria asks.

"Oh, uh, he's in Canada. On a business trip."

"While his older brother's demise approaches?" Austria's voice is measured and pleasant despite everything he's implying. "That doesn't seem right."

I bite back an irritated remark. But why should I? Holding my tongue has never been my style. "Listen, Austria. He's on his way. He's doing everything he can. Anyway, it's not like he can just appear in the air. And it's not very nice to describe my death as a 'demise.' You know you'll miss me. No one awesome to hang out with. Yeah."

Austria doesn't say anything this time, just looks at my hand. "What's on the paper?"

"Oh." I look at the sheet, suddenly embarrassed. I had planned to read it to Austria with no regrets, just forceful insistence and such. But now I can't.

Austria reaches his hand out, and relieved, I give it to him. It's much better if he just reads it instead of hearing me fumble my words.

I wrote a list. A list of things I want Austria to do - and they're pretty reasonable, so there's no reason why he _shouldn't. _

_1) Make sure Germany doesn't go crazy._

_2) Bathe Gilbird. He likes bonbons, too. Spoil him for me._

_3) Watch over Hungary. If you only do one thing on this list, please do this one. Please._

_4) Build a marble and diamond shrine to forever remember the awesome me. _

Okay, maybe four isn't so reasonable. But one through three shouldn't be an issue.

"This is all you want?" Austria asks, a trace of a smile creeping up his face. "I'm not surprised."

I shuffle over to the stove and set some water to boil. Screw Austria and his sarcasm. I'm making hot chocolate. "You want some?"

"Some what?"

"Hot chocolate," I say.

Austria considers this. "No, thank you. But you are quite fond of the stuff, right?"

"Yeah," I reply, glancing out the window and watching snow fall. A bird lands on a tree branch, sending a shower of glittering white down to the ground. All these years, and I still can't believe that every snowflake is different. Is that possible? I mean, there are only so many possible patterns, so why haven't we -

I jump when the phone rings.

"Moment," I say, and hurry over to it. "Hello? Prussia here. Oh. Oh! You're on the way, Italy? Yes, Austria's here now. Oh, I don't know, maybe thirty minutes? Great." Italy's words are fast-paced and his accent is difficult for me to understand, but after being around the dork for decades, I know my way around it.

I talk with him for about five minutes, and when I hang up, Austria is gone. I didn't hear him leave. He didn't say goodbye, and neither did I. I feel a pang of sadness - I'll never see him again, that's for sure - but something sitting on the kitchen table catches my attention. A box.

Austria left it here.

I open the plain brown package. If Austria brought me a present, it's probably another pair of patched underwear, or maybe a used reimported cuckoo clock. He usually sends me one of those around my birthday. I hate them.

I gasp. Inside the box is high-quality Swiss chocolate, a packet of the Vietnamese cinnamon Austria uses in his tea, cheese that the cheapskate normally won't touch because it'll demolish his budget, and a bottle of one of the most expensive wines I've ever heard of in my entire life. _Seriously._

He left a note, too. His elegant, looping cursive is a thousand times prettier than my atrocious scrawl.

It's a single sentence.

_You were worth it._

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><p>I use Austria's chocolate and cinnamon in the hot chocolate and make sure to save a cup for Italy. I know he'll want some, and should be here any minute.<p>

The chocolate is extremely dark and extremely bitter, so bitter that I wince when I taste it. By dumping in more cocoa and sugar, I'm kind of able to cancel out the dark chocolate - which I probably shouldn't have put in the drink anyway - but I'm not thinking very rationally anymore.

The result is a bittersweet drink that brings tears to my eyes.

Wait. Bitter_sweet?_

All I can taste is the bitter.

I hear the ticking of the clock in the silent kitchen. Austria got here an hour ago, and left... well, I'm not sure.

But I have eleven hours now.

I text Germany, asking when he thinks he'll get here, and then remember miserably that he's probably on a plane and has his phone turned off. Which means I can't ask Canada, either.

Living at Germany's house, I'm used to being alone.

But now I'm actually _lonely. _

I drink the rest of my God-awful hot chocolate, which is a bit like drinking England's tea - terrible, and I speak from experience - but the thought only makes me sadder, because I invited England and he still hasn't replied to the e-mail I sent him. He hasn't even said if he's going to come or not.

Just as I'm about to drown in my miserable thoughts (death, bitter chocolate, loneliness, and the fact that I might not get to say goodbye to anyone important), the doorbell rings. It's one of the sweetest sounds I've ever heard, and I jump up from the kitchen table with such vigor that my mug splashes a bit of cocoa on West's polished wooden table. I curse and attempt to mop up the mess with my sleeve.

Despite the fact that I am about to die, I can only think: _If West sees one thing out of place - well, I better be dead by then! _

"Come in," I call, waiting patiently for Italy's trademark sobbing.

The door opens, followed by a blast of icy air.

But it's not Italy.


	2. Chapter 2

"America," I say as the North American nation closes the door. "I didn't know you were coming."

He nods at me, solemn. I hate it. I wanted America to bust through the door with McDonald's and a smile. I so wanted to hear him share his news in the enthusiastic, endearing way he always does, like everything he says to anyone is massively important and he's giving you a wonderful gift by letting you hear it. I wanted... I want...

I want to _live,_ dammit!

"Hi," I say uncomfortably.

He breaks into an uneasy smile. "Hey. What's up?" His voice trembles. So does his right eye. A while back, I learned that whenever America's upset and about to cry, his right eye twitches ever-so-slightly. I've pointed this out to him before, and he just rolls his eyes and tells me to look elsewhere.

"Do you want to get something to eat?" America asks.

I'm about to say no, because Italy should be here any second, but clearly fate is sending me a message because two things happen at the same time: my stomach growls and the phone rings. It's Italy calling again, and he says traffic is terrible and he'll be there in about an hour. He apologizes profusely and I have to hang up because I worry he's getting hysterical. And his driving skills are already pretty bad.

I shrug. "To lunch," I say, and America follows me out the door.

* * *

><p>I remember a few weeks after I was released from Russia's house - decades ago - America stopped by my house (well, okay, <em>Germany's<em> house), and brought me some sweets. He also had a stack of papers stapled together. We ate the sweets while he told me stories of what had been going on in the world, since Russia restricted my information flow, and then he handed me the packet.

It was page after page of handwritten notes. Some of the papers were a bit wrinkled, and some others had coffee stains, but they were all legible and every single one had a signature. I recognized the handwriting of Spain, Japan, and England on the first three pages. "What's this?" I asked, leafing through the packet slowly.

America smiled at me. "They're condolences," he said. "Everyone wrote you letters. I heard what a hard time you'd had at Russia's, so I rallied a bunch of people together and we made this. And we wrote them all in German. Of course, some of them weren't fluent in German, so we got Germany and Austria to help us."

"You arranged this yourself?" I asked, half disbelieving. I couldn't imagine people like America and Japan and _Romano_ sitting down and writing me comforting letters in German, having Austria or whoever scan them over for spelling errors. It was incredibly touching.

America looked embarrassed. "Y-yeah, but it isn't that big of a deal."

He wasn't expecting me to hug him.

I did anyway.

* * *

><p>As we pull into the parking lot of a restaurant, I'm thinking about the packet. I haven't looked at it in years, but I'm positive it's still in the bottom drawer of my dresser, buried under my shirts. I park my car and we hustle toward the restaurant. At least the roads and walkways have been plowed recently. I've picked a quick little place to eat in Berlin, and people are hurrying down the sidewalks, carrying holiday shopping bags or talking on cell phones. A group of teenagers rushes past America and me, laughing and shouting. I was like that not too long ago. I have a memory from just last week of me hauling Germany down the street, Christmas shopping for some of our geographical neighbors. The cold stings my lungs. I mutter a prayer in German. I don't know if I'm talking to Austria or America or God Himself.<p>

"Prussia," America says, holding the door open. "You coming?"

I turn to him and switch to English. "I won't make it to Christmas," I whisper.

He closes the door and buries his hands in his pockets, blinking to keep the snow out of his eyes. "What?"

I close my eyes. "I won't be able to go to your annual Christmas party, America. I won't get to give West his gift. I won't get to engage in the EU's Christmastime snowball fight. I bought everyone presents. I forgot. I completely forgot about Christmas. I'll never sing Christmas carols again. Or help Liechtenstein hang up her tangled lights. Or go sledding. I'm not going to even get to have my last Christmas."

America is looking at something over my shoulder. Suddenly, he turns and grabs the metal trash can lids off the trash cans sitting in front of the restaurant. He grabs my wrist. "Come on," he insists. "We're going to go sledding."

And we do.

We climb up a snowy hill and slide down it on the trash can lids. The snow is perfect for sledding, and I'm sure we look crazy. Several people are watching us with confused looks on their faces, but it is so much fun. The owner of the restaurant comes out and yells at us for taking his garbage lids, and America just shouts at him in English, infuriating him. We drive home without eating anything but feeling a thousand times better.

"America?" I ask.

"Hmm?"

"Thank you."

"Welcome, dude." He hesitates. "Prussia. Are you... are you sure you're dying?"

I nod. "Yes. I don't know how to explain it, only that I'm positive. I've been feeling worse over the last twelve hours, too. I'm positive it will be today."

"Are..." he breaks off, biting his lip. "Are you scared?"

I shrug. "Not of dying. I'm just scared... well, I'm scared that in a hundred years or so, nations like you and Germany and France won't even remember me. You won't remember any of the good times we've had or friendships, or, or anything," I confess. "That's what I'm scared of."

When we get back to my driveway, Italy's car is already pulled in next to America's.

"I'm gonna get going," he says slowly, like he doesn't want the hour-long visit to end. Let me tell you something: America can drink, like, five milkshakes in ten minutes, and he can devour burgers like a pig. But whenever he gets red velvet cake, he eats it super slowly. I once asked him why he picks at it so much. Does he not like it?

"No," he explained. "Red velvet is my absolute favorite. I want to savor it."

Maybe it's like that for him. It's like that for me.

Every time I say bye to someone, I'm one step closer to the end, which is approaching rapidly. All I want to do is fall down in the snow, hug it, kiss it. I don't want to die.

I want to savor my life.

But it's not my choice.

"Okay," I agree. "Listen, America."

He turns to look at me, his car keys looped around one finger. I have his undivided attention, and I'm worried. This is the last thing I'll say to him. I don't want to screw it up. First impressions are important, but so are last ones. He'll remember this, I hope, for a long time. I don't want to leave him with a marred memory.

"I hope your Christmas party is awesome," I begin, trying not to cry. "You're still really young, so I hope you'll be okay, and that your country and citizens will be okay too. I hope you'll still go drinking with Denmark every so often, even if I'm not there anymore. I've really enjoyed your company. You're a really good friend."

He smiles sadly. He's crying now. He lunges for me.

I'm not expecting him to hug me.

He does anyway.


End file.
